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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28435005">Dead to the World</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodfish_bowl/pseuds/goodfish_bowl'>goodfish_bowl</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Danny Phantom</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Gen, Lots of Angst, maybe body horror??, nondescript warning for feels</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 20:28:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,474</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28435005</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodfish_bowl/pseuds/goodfish_bowl</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>There was a hazy time period, right after Danny walked into the portal, and then woke up at his own funeral. </p><p>Based on that one prompt on Tumblr about Danny waking up at his own funeral, it's popped up a few times and I decided to take it and run away with it. Mine now.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>259</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>           Danny remembered exactly what happened after he tripped inside of the portal. He remembered that moment of whirring electricity before he <em>had felt it</em>. A hum in the air before everything fell apart. When it came, it came in full. It had torn and ripped him apart with such ferocity and animosity you’d think he’d done something to offend it. Well, Danny supposed he had been the one to turn it on. It raced and burned through him, a wicked arch starting in his hand and then spreading to the rest of him, like a limb falling asleep, but also getting set on fire. It tore apart his ability to feel in seconds, or at least it felt like seconds.</p><p>            Danny’s vision blurred out, unfocused, on anything but white, green, red, and black. He could no longer see. His lungs ceased to function, and his throat felt raw and torn apart, <em>had he been screaming?</em> Danny felt like someone had set him on fire, or one of the ecto-weapons had shot him, except it was his entire body, raw and sensitive. But it also felt like he’d been dumped into a frozen river. His senses were shot, and he could barely feel the pain, that awful boring and numbness and cold, but he could no longer feel <em>himself </em>either. Where were his arms and legs? Was he still standing? He couldn’t feel the ground beneath him at all. There was awful strain in his chest, as <em>something </em>tried to continue working before it gave out.</p><p>            Then it stopped. He was no longer in pain whatsoever, like he had never been hurt in the first place. His mind cleared up and he could focus on something other than the pain, just for that moment. Hadn’t Tucker and Sam been outside the portal when it turned on? Well, this probably wasn’t the most pleasant thing for them to experience. Wow, Mom and Dad weren’t going to be happy he was messing around in the lab, they’d probably be furious, and Jazz would be a mess, lecturing him after his parents were done fussing over him. He wasn’t looking forward to that at all. He was just hurt, <em>right?</em> He’d come out just fine, and then he’d get the lecture and fussing-over of his life. </p><p>            The lights and pain were gone now, but Danny still couldn’t feel anything. Maybe he was just in shock? He tried to get up, to let out a weak laugh, and imagine the pain he had experienced away, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t feel his limbs. <em>He wasn’t breathing. </em>Danny so desperately tried to take a breath, to at least get the air into the lungs he could no longer feel. Then he felt something. He felt cold and hollow, and the blackness closed around not just around his sight, but his mind as well. He fought against it as hard as he could, because he knew what was coming. <em>He didn’t want to die. </em>Well, he supposed very few people did. Danny fought and struggled against the darkness with everything he had in him, or whatever was left, but it wasn’t enough. The darkness came, and it devoured him whole.</p><p>            Daniel Fenton had died, days after his 14<sup>th</sup> birthday, due to electrocution in his parent’s basement. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>           Sam knew she was never going to forget the moment the portal had turned on. She wasn’t going to forget how the darkness and the strange, too-bright, green lighting had reflected off of the white and black hazmat suit Danny had put on before steeping inside. She wasn’t going to forget the expression on Danny’s face as he tripped over some loose wiring on the floor of the portal. He had been surprised, his eyes had widened just a fraction and he had let out a small, a rather unmanly yelp before his hand connected to the wall to steady himself. She wasn’t going to forget how that expression shifted as the portal powered on, humming with electricity like an old appliance before it unleashed all of its fury at once. She wasn’t going to forget how she had called out his name in warning second too late, as the bright green white of the portal had roared to life, blinding her, and only overcome by one noise. Sam wasn’t <em>ever </em>going to forget how Danny <em>shrieked in agony </em>as it reduced him to a smoking corpse, sizzling and twitching in the blackened metal of the portal, within a fraction of a second. The sound was going to echo through her mind and nightmares no matter what she would tell herself. <em>Sam was never going to forget that she was the one who had killed her best friend. </em></p><p>          She and Tucker had sat there for minutes, too shocked to move, just waiting. They were waiting for Danny to take an unsteady breath, then laugh, maybe limp his way out. They were waiting for <em>anything. </em>Any indicator that the glue in their friendship was alright. Any indicator that Danny was alive. But he didn’t move, and the twitching stopped seconds after the portal had shut itself off, and the power had gone out, probably causing an outage on the whole block. With a groan, a back-up generator had kicked on, bathing the lab in subtle, blue-green light, turning all the metal in the lab to ice, just like the blood in her veins.  </p><p>         The power going out had been enough to draw attention to the lab from all the Fentons, the remaining ones at least. Sam refused to believe <em>Danny was dead. </em>He couldn’t be. Yeah, he was just knocked out, unconscious. Why wasn’t she going over there to make sure he was ok? Probably because she knew that if she did, she would know for sure that she had killed her best friend.</p><p>         Jazz was the first one to enter the lab quickly followed by Mr. and Mrs. Fenton. Jazz quickly took in the situation, demanding to her parents to stop whatever they had done to make the power go out, only to find Sam and Tucker frozen in the middle of the lab and Danny d-… passed out in the portal. Jack Fenton was quick to go by his daughter’s side to where Danny lay. Maddie Fenton, on the other hand, quietly asked what had happened.</p><p>        Something inside Sam broke then. What <em>had </em>happened? It had been so fast; she couldn’t really wrap her head around it. She tried to tell Mrs. Fenton, she really did, but she choked up. She couldn’t say a thing. Sam, who had always been so vocal and outspoken was rendered mute, Danny’s scream echoing between her ears.</p><p>        Jazz let out a pained cry from the portal, and Danny was gently gathered into his father’s arms. Mr. Fenton looked pale and horrified; Jazz was on the verge of hysterics. Neither expression suited their respective wearer. </p><p>        Some words were exchanged, but Sam didn’t hear them, only focused on Danny’s limp form in Mr. Fenton’s arms, he looked like he was asleep, if only it weren’t for his ashen skin, and <em>electrical burns covering most of his body </em>revealed where the hazmat suit had been torn off, exposing the blackened skin underneath. Sam could <em>smell </em>his burnt skin and the scent of burnt up electronics from the portal. She did her best to avoid hurling or even associating the two together<em>. It had been all her fault.</em></p><p>         At some point, the authorities had been called, and her parents had come to pick her up. She didn’t refuse the hug from her parents as she was loaded into some unbelievably expensive car and toted off back home, a place she always tried to stay away from except as a place to sleep and eat. She didn’t push them away as they embraced her in the living room, whispering sweet nothings to her, as she finally broke and cried out in anguish at what she had done.</p><p>
  <em>       Danny had died and it was all her fault. </em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>            Tucker was faring just about as well as Sam was, to be honest, except he never broke down. It probably wasn’t healthy, to keep everything locked up, but all he could see behind the lenses of his glasses was Danny, charred and burnt in his Dad’s arms. He remembered the sound of the portal coming to life as it took Danny’s. He had been fascinated at the time, with all of the technology that the Fentons created, he had wanted to see the impossible machine for himself and had completely disregarded the danger Danny was in as soon as he agreed to Sam’s <em>stupid, stupid </em>dare to <em>go inside </em>the damn thing<em>. </em> </p><p>            Tucker had electrocuted and burned himself on electronics countless times while messing with his <em>oh-so-precious </em>technology, so he knew how it felt, but just couldn’t imagine what Danny had gone through in his last moments. Electrocution was not a way he wanted to go. But now his best friend, one of the only ones that he actually <em>knew, </em>a friend that wasn’t behind a computer screen, but a physical, tangible person, one he had known for most of his life, was dead.</p><p>            Tucker looked over at the lonesome PDA sitting on his computer littered desk amongst the trash and miscellaneous tech-parts he had been messing with or intending to mess with after school. He let out a lonesome sigh, unwilling to leave his place in bed to retrieve it, in fact, the thought filled him with disdain. He envied the Fentons’ for their skill in technology, now he wasn’t so sure. The very tech he loved and worshipped so dearly had taken his one tangible friend from him. He wasn’t even sure he could call the people he had met through the internet friends, since he knew practically nothing about them outside of whatever he had connected with them over in the first place.</p><p>            There was still Sam, he supposed, but he currently wanted nothing to do with her. She probably needed to be alone right now anyway. If she hadn’t dared Danny to go inside, he would still be alive. But yet again, Tucker hadn’t tried to dissuade her or stop Danny from going in in the first place.  Yes, he blamed Sam for Danny’s death, but he wasn’t innocent either. He never would’ve gone near it if he hadn’t been so fascinated with the tech required to pierce through <em>entire realities </em>in the first place. He was to blame for Danny’s death too.</p><p>             Tucker looked at the PDA and assortment of computer parts on his table with a scornful looked, the whirring of the portal powering up overcoming any sense of self-doubt he had in what he was about to do. He mustered up the will and half-dragged himself to his desk, glancing over every detail of his beloved collection and part of his contribution to the future as a “techno geek”. He pulled the trashcan out from under his desk and with a sweep of his arm, cleared the entire desk inside. Something broke in the bin, but he refused to even acknowledge it. For the first time in ages, he saw the clean surface of his desk. His heart panged at what he had done, but it didn’t last for long. Tech could always be replaced, people couldn’t. Tucker unlocked his door, set the full trashcan right outside for his mom to find, then closed and relocked the door. He trudged back into bed and stared blankly at the ceiling. After a moment, he took off his beanie and glasses, setting them on his nightstand.</p><p>            Tucker had no idea where he was supposed to go from here. Should he cry, break down, trash his room? Instead, he just felt hollow, and he refused to seek comfort in the online discourse and disconnect from everything around him like he always did. He refused to do anything, even think. He just sat there, empty and hollow, blank and empty like a wiped hard drive. Tucker didn’t know how he was supposed to mourn his best friend, he didn’t know if he could. He didn’t know if he would ever find anything, he could use to fix himself. Computers could be fixed and modified to work how someone wanted them to, but not people.</p><p>            Electronics were replaceable, but people weren’t, and that fact left Tucker hollow.   </p><p> </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>            Daniel James Fenton’s funeral was planned three days after his death. His body had been whisked off to the morgue while his family desperately tried to figure out what had happened. Madeline Fenton had tried to get either of the kids to tell her, but both had been practically catatonic with shock, they had witnessed it, after all. Maddie was near hysterics herself, but she couldn’t yet. She had to make sure her boy got a proper burial first, then she could break down. She had three days.  </p><p>            Jack had wanted to have Danny cremated, but Maddie had vehemently refused. It was a tradition in his family line, not hers. She wanted to have a grave she could visit and mourn over. The funeral was a simple one, just friends and family, no matter how hard the news reporters pushed to come.</p><p>            That had been another thing Maddie had to deal with, the news. It wasn’t every day a boy as young as Danny died in such a tragic way, and journalists did love tragedies. They had been getting so much unwanted criticism lately. A more opinionate journalist claimed it was <em>their </em>fault Danny had died in the lab because they had failed to put proper safety measures in place to prevent this sort of thing from happening. Another journalist questioned their decision to have a lab in general, claiming that the “science” they did was bogus, and if they <em>really </em>needed a lab, they should’ve rented a warehouse or office, away from the home and their children.</p><p>            Maddie refused to admit to herself that <em>they were right</em> and moving the lab had been a frequent argument between her and Jack. It was a decision between safety and leaving the kids home alone. A warehouse would’ve also given them much more space to work with rather than the cramped basement. But that decision had been made for them, Maddie and Jack no longer had any disagreements about what was going to happen concerning the lab.</p><p>It had been a long and solemn conversation between her and Jack, but they decided the lab had to go, completely. Their science had not only taken their son from them but had also taken away most of the time they should’ve used raising their children. Maddie regretted it deeply that she hadn’t spent as much time with Danny as she should’ve, more fixated on her work rather than her children. Jack and Maddie had decided together that they were dismantling the lab and the portal along with it. They were giving up their search for ghosts, then searching for new jobs to supplement the income they earned from their numerous patents.  They were no longer going to be ghost hunters, just the Fentons.</p><p>                 The funeral was closed-casket, held in one of the smaller halls Amity had available to rent. Collapsible chairs were lined up in neat rows, parted in the middle, enough to seat 50, but only half were actually being used. Maddie had invited both Sam and Tuckers families, and then the little family she and Jack had left. Alicia, Maddie’s sister, had booked a flight as soon as the news reached her. Jack’s family was unsurprisingly unreachable as always. But what had been surprising was when an old college friend of theirs, Vlad Masters, had reached out to them and offered to come. Vlad had come up with a fortune since their college days and had snatched away most of the bills for the funeral, even helping her plan.</p><p>                 When people began to arrive, everyone was dressed in black, apart from one person. Sam Manson was in blue. She wore a long, deep navy dress, the bottom decorated with silver rhinestones, making the bottom half resemble the night sky Danny had loved enough to reach for. Tucker was dressed in black, beanie missing. He wasn’t wearing or carrying a singular piece of technology that day, no matter how much he used to cling to it. Their families seemed to fade into the background, taking seats a row back with Alicia, while the Fentons, Sam, Tucker, and Vlad Masters sat in the first row.</p><p>               The casket Maddie had managed to find for Danny was a simple one, but that was enough. It was made of a simple oak, strong enough to withstand the tests of time, meaning it wouldn’t collapse when buried underground. The inside was a soft, silky, black cloth, padded as much as any cot or thin mattress could be. Maddie didn’t have the wits at the moment to be <em>incredibly </em>picky, but she still wanted to get something of quality. Inside, Danny had been changed out of the burned hazmat suit into something else. Maddie had given the morticians in his favorite outfit, his NASA hoodie and a torn-up pair of jeans. Jazz had been the one to joke about how Danny would be buried in that hoodie, and now he was. A colorful array of flowers in a variety of cool colors was piled up on top of the casket and around it, courtesy of Vlad, who had ordered the massive arrangement only a day prior, and had it rushed at a massive fee.</p><p>             Another five minutes after everyone settled down, it was time to begin. Maddie pulled herself out of her chair and steeled herself. She could do this. It had been three days, and she only had to get through this, then she could grieve herself. Maddie walked up to the mic stand and began the funeral.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>             After the black was gone, there was green. Danny didn’t know where he was, he wasn’t sure if he was really any <em>place </em>at all. It was green, and that green flowed <em>through </em>him like he wasn’t even there. But he could <em>feel </em>it, it was the only thing he could feel outside of his own thoughts, which were convoluted and confused, too many questions, so he preferred not to think. It poured over him like water, swirled <em>inside </em>of him for a moment, then left on its merry way. He couldn’t speak, and he didn’t have arms or legs, he was just a speck of dust in the wind, a small green blob amongst the rest of the green, given eyes to see and nothing else.</p><p>            Danny, (if he was Danny, he couldn’t remember), floated through the green, wandering through it, a small sense of wonder and curiosity being his only motivation.  The green swirled in the distance, forming endless spirals and twists in a continuous pattern Danny would never have been able to replicate on paper. There were occasional masses of black, islands that seemed to disobey all laws of physics as they sat suspended in space. Sometimes there were building on them, and sometimes there were people too. They were odd beings, with strangely colored skin and weird clothes, some looked human while others didn’t. They usually ignored him or couldn’t see him as he wandered about the endless expanse of green before him.</p><p>              One place looked like a medieval kingdom, peasants going about their daily business, living(?) lives that seemed absolutely miserable. The low lived in filth, toiling away while barely reaping any reward for their labor, suffering, and existing for no other purpose than to be taken advantage of. There were knights and nobles here too, but they only took from the peasants before returning to the great castle that took up most of this floating island. The castle was lavish, covered in draconic symbols and displays of power. Danny didn’t dare go near the throne, only peaked through to see a cruel king on a cruel throne. He wandered through the castle a bit more, finding small nooks and crannies to explore, not tiring as he went. Up in the tallest tower, there was a woman, or at least she looked like a woman, peering down on the miserable little village just outside the wall of the great and terrible castle. She looked just as miserable as the peasants, if not more. She looked a bit like the cruel king, but she was kind, and also locked away. She was sad. He floated around her for a bit, and she looked at him, not through him. He revealed in the fact that someone(?) could see him, and she gave a small smile at his joy, poking him with a finger.</p><p>              “Thank you, little one, but I think you have a better place to be than here,” she said. Danny didn’t know, but he decided she was probably right. He had somewhere he was supposed to be going, so he left the kingdom with its miserable peasants, cruel king, and sad princess behind.</p><p>              Another island(?) was covered with forestry, and a river running through it. Some strange animal-like creatures wandered through there, some regarding him passively before leaving. But they were afraid, and it seemed like they had every right to be. Moments after, a large, metal man came bursting through the tree, equipped with all sorts of blasters and rockets, pursuing the animals with a lustful, gleeful fury. Danny decided to hide, slipping easily into small crannies and under bushes, away from the eyes of the hunter. He didn’t dare go near the large skull-like structure at the peak of the island, it gave him a bad feeling. He left that island without discovering much more than that it was a scary, bad place to be, and that it wasn’t where he was supposed to be going.  </p><p>             The final place he went through was a library, large enough that it became its own labyrinth, full of so many books their titles blurred together in his mind. There were so many books, some looked fresh off the press while others looked like they had been saved seconds from turning to ashes, or barely kept from turning to dust, tomes snatched away seconds before their destruction. (<em>Jazz would’ve loved this place)</em>. He didn’t care to try and read one of the many books that were splayed open across the numerous library tables. He couldn’t seem to grasp the words for more than a few seconds before they slipped carelessly from his mind. There was only one person(?) in the entire library, mumbling incoherently as he typed away on a strange keyboard, the words themselves incomprehensible, or in some other language Danny didn’t understand. They didn’t acknowledge him, but they knew he was there, since the writer gave him half a glance, then huffed and returned to his writing. The library seemed to be so lonely, full of knowledge yet no one to read it, only the writer who continued to make books without anyone there to take in the story. Danny left this place too, because he felt like this wasn’t the place he was supposed to be going. </p><p>             There, Danny decided, that’s where he was supposed to be going. Large, black gears floated haphazardly around the green, surrounding what seemed to be a clocktower. A large pendulum, like a grandfather clock, swung lethargically in the center of it, internal gears visible through the glass. A large set of wooden doors were open just wide enough for him to slip through, so he did. The inside matched the outside perfectly, exposed gears working walls and barriers in-between spaces, with a set of stairs ascending to somewhere above. Clocks covered every available wall space, clocks ticking seemingly at random, some fast some slow, others broken and not moving at all. There were screens too, shows places Danny didn’t recognize and scenes he couldn’t make sense of.  </p><p>“<strong>It seems you’ve found the place you’re supposed to be, Danny,</strong>” the being said.</p><p>            They were blue with solid red eyes, a large scar going across the right one. A purple cloak covered his(?) shoulders and he lacked feet, a trailing tail taking their place. His chest was the inside of a grandfather clock, the pendulum swinging away as if it wasn’t part of a person. The being carried a staff of sorts, the top pronging out into a crescent with something that looked like a stopwatch suspended in the middle. Danny didn’t know how he knew his name, (if his name was, in fact, ‘Danny’), but that meant he was in the right place. He wasn’t scared of this being either, he knew he would’ve hurt him. He was supposed to be here after all.</p><p>            “<strong>Now let's get you home</strong>,” he hummed, taking Danny from the air and cupping him in his hands.</p><p>             Danny was brought over to a green circle, it swirled more definitely than the green outside. It went someplace. Danny looked up at the being, who smiled down at him reassuringly. He was given a small toss and thrown through the green disk, vanishing within it.</p><p>            “<strong>All is as it should be</strong>.”</p><p>
  <em>            And then the green was replaced with black once more.    </em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>            Danny’s bloodless body rested beneath the cool, dark wood, engulfed in dark the dark, silky cloth that made up the interior of the casket, hidden away from the world. He had become a pale, hollow vessel, void of life in any form. And then he wasn’t.</p><p>            A small green entity emerged from a portal no bigger than a fist, directly into Danny’s chest cavity, then froze solid, right next to what had once been his heart. It shifted from a small green blob to a crystalline structure, emitting a soft light that would’ve been visibly through the skin, then it seeped out green.</p><p>            The green slowly filed out what had once been veins, turning what had been red into green, fixing things as it spread. Burns and scars faded away, melting to the skin until they were barely visible lines, only seen when inspected closely. It flooded muscles that had since ceased up and massaged them back into working condition. A finger twitched. The green went upwards, preserving the mind and all the memories it once and will hold. It fixed and reconnected nerves that had been severed and damaged, restoring feeling to every part of the body. And then, once everything else was as it was supposed to be, the green seized his heart, flooding it with a burst of energy. Danny’s heart burst to life once more, as if it hadn’t stopped beating in three days. </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>            Danny’s eyes burst wide open, still alight with green energy as he gasped in musty, still air. He gasped and panted, reclaiming feeling over his own body, confused and disoriented. He glanced around in a panic, <em>who turned out the lights!? </em>After catching his breath, nose wrinkling at the odd smell of his surroundings, Danny reached out an arm, only to hit something solid inches from his nose. He tried a different direction, only to be met with the same result. <em>He was boxed in. </em></p><p>            Danny couldn’t remember how he got here, the last thing he remembered was… He thought for a moment. The last thing he remembered was stepping into the portal, then pain, and then green. The first event was perfectly clear in his mind. Sam had dared him to go check it out, and he had, only to trip, and then the portal had turned on. He… he had gotten hurt really bad… <em>right?</em> And the memory of green must’ve come from the inside of the portal… His mind throbbed in exhaustion and pain, unable to make sense of his situation or the hazy memories between then and now. Why was he lying down in a box?</p><p>            Danny pushed upwards, but the top wouldn’t budge. There was barely enough room inside for him to fit, he couldn’t properly attempt to lift it. Was Jazz sitting on top of it or something? Was this a prank for passing out in the portal? Didn’t Sam and Tucker know he could suffocate in here?!</p><p>            Danny began to pound on the surface and cry out for help. His voice was course and his throat dry, causing him to cough as soon as he tried to cry out. Why was he so thirsty? Did he sleep with his mouth open or something? Despite the pain, he continued to cry out, pounding weakly on the lid for help. He couldn’t hear anything outside of the box, not even a snicker, and hopelessly wondered if they could hear him.</p><p>            Suddenly the lid of the box lifted, or at least half of it was, and Danny was blinded by the light that assaulted his eyes. Strong, unfamiliar hands lifted him into a sitting position while his eyes slowly readjusted, wincing as his stiff legs and body were forced to move, it felt like he had cramps everywhere. The green flickered away from his eyes as the lights from the ceiling slowly filtered in and Danny saw a small crowd of people, most he recognized, one he didn’t, the man who pulled him out of the dark box. Danny’s mind could barely make sense of what he was seeing. The looks he was getting from his friends and family, horrified, confused, shock, awe didn’t make sense in his tired and exhausted state<em>. </em>He didn’t like what his mind concluded, somehow making much less sense than any prank he could’ve imagined. </p><p>            Daniel Fenton had woken up at his own funeral.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Alone</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>This part didn't fit very well in the original, so, as I promised, I added it on as an extra chapter. The entire thing is from Vlad's perspective, so have fun with that.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>               Vladimir Masters knew an opportunity when he saw one and knew better than to let one pass him by. He had been meaning to reconnect with his (former) college “friends” in recent times, either way. He <em>was</em> going to plan a “college reunion”, but then, of course, there had been a sudden change, and not all change is bad. While the nature of the event was surely tragic, the opportunity it presented was not. In fact, it was one of the best things to happen to him personally in a long while. When Maddie’s son passed in a heartbreaking accident, Vlad’s only thought had been that he should be there to support her, and he pushed his long-schemed plan ahead of schedule by <em>months</em>. With Maddie in the fragile state she most surely was in, he would be able to sweep her into his arms, and away from Jack’s with much less hassle than his original plan.</p><p>                Vlad’s new plan was simple enough compared to his old one. He would show up, and offer Maddie much needed consolation and support, help her through this trying event, and somehow twist it so that the boy’s death would have been Jack’s fault. Nothing was more powerful than a mother’s love, after all, and such a thing would drive Jack far off, and Vlad that much closer to what his heart desired. He would hardly have to do much of it himself if everything went swimmingly. Maddie would realize his feelings for her, and she would return them. Then he would have her to himself, and he would finally be complete.</p><p>                When Vlad heard how the boy, Daniel, he believed had been his name, had died, he almost burst out laughing at the irony of it all. A portal. The boy had died <em>inside </em>of a ghost portal, electrocuted to death. He almost found it hilarious that a portal had killed Jack’s son due to his mistakes. They had found several obvious, exposed electrical problems inside the portal that had been the <em>exact </em>cause of death for young Daniel, a mistake Vlad knew Maddie would never make. Jack had not only killed his (former) best friend, but his own <em>son, </em>using the same damn thing no less. Vlad wonders if this was some sort of karma inflicted onto Jack for what he had done to him so many years prior, and only wished it hadn’t affected Maddie so deeply as well. The jumpsuit-clad buffoon had had it coming.</p><p>                But, something about the whole thing bothered Vlad, a gut feeling. No, it was something in his <em>core, </em>not his gut. <em>But it was impossible</em>, the boy was dead as a doornail, he hadn’t survived, and surely wouldn’t become what he was, despite the similarity in their cases. There was a much higher chance of the boy becoming a full ghost, especially since he had died <em>inside</em> the portal, than becoming a half-ghost. The boy had crossed over too-completely for Vlad to have that vain sense of hope his core insisted on feeling, <em>that he would no longer be alone. </em>Vlad <em>would </em>no longer be alone once he had Maddie, he reasoned.  She would accept him and <em>love </em>him, completely, even if not at first, she would eventually. Then he would finally feel complete. But it tugged <em>insistently, hopelessly hoping </em>that the boy would <em>come back. </em>It would sooth Maddie, he supposed in a way, if her son somehow <em>survived </em>his period beyond the veil, and he could still continue to drive it between her and Jack, since the boy, Daniel, would no longer be alive either.</p><p>                Vlad spent the next two days helping Maddie where and whenever he could. He had never met either of Maddie’s children before now, so he wasn’t expected to make a speech at this event, a rare thing for the CEO. Jazz was pleasant enough in her grief-stricken state. Smart, almost frighteningly so, but he’d expect no less from Maddie’s daughter. The only traits of Jack she exhibited would be her own fixation on psychology and her tendency to be easily distracted. Thankfully, there was little resemblance otherwise, and he was keen to dote on the girl to gain Maddie’s affections. He spent a comparable amount of money on flowers, paid for the hall where the funeral would be held, and even covered the cost of the gravesite where Daniel would be buried after the funeral. He didn’t know what kind of flowers Maddie liked, something he definitely <em>should know</em>, so he bought them all and had them arranged into a draping arrangement to be displayed on the casket. He was sure she appreciated the sentiment without knowing its full purpose.</p><p>                Vlad was extremely careful on the day of the funeral, as he soothed Maddie. He had to be careful what words he said and even how and where he stepped. He had to make sure not to insult or aggravate her in her fragile state, less she turned on him instead of her own husband. He decided he wouldn’t drive her and Jack apart just yet, not until she had at least partially recovered from her grief, it would be easier then than it would be now. If those 20 years locked away taught him anything, it was patience. He wore an expensive, yet strikingly simple, black suit to the funeral. Maddie was the star of it all, all eyes should be on her, not him, for once. He was in awe of her the entire time, clinging to her every word and action, how the black dress she wore clung to her frame in a modest, yet oh so <em>thought-provoking</em> way, at least to him.</p><p>                 Vlad was surprised when he actually recognized one of the attendees, the Mansons. They were a rich, influential, and well-connected family, and liked to isolate themselves to the higher-class circles, so he was genuinely surprised to find them here. Their daughter, whom he had never had the displeasure of meeting, was apparently a close friend of Daniel’s and he could appreciate the eloquence of the dress she wore. Vlad didn’t even give the Mansons a second glance.</p><p>                Vlad was fixated on Maddie’s opening speech about her son and ached a bit inside. He couldn’t tell if it was his core or his cold, lonesome heart that clenched at the near-visible pain Maddie was in, but it tugged at his heartstrings all the same. She spoke of memories she had with Daniel, some embarrassing and heartfelt others near-tragic, as she recalled how he grew up. Vlad watched her stave off tears with all her strength as she trudged on and his love for her only grew. He barely heard the words she was speaking, but he clung to every single one of them.</p><p>                Then, of all the damnest things, his core burst out, burning him internally, <em>another ghost was nearby</em>. Small and weak, but it was there all the same. He glanced around, bitter to have his attention torn away from Maddie, but this was important. Ghosts <em>knew</em> not to bother him as Masters. He swiveled his head around, careful to be subtle in his sudden change of focus. He couldn’t spot anything, but there was a ghost nearby, very nearby, <em>but where?</em>  </p><p>                It was quiet, muffled, inaudible to all but him. Cries for help and banging on <em>wood, </em>desperate and pleading, and weakening by the second. <em>They were coming from the casket</em>.</p><p>                Vlad hated what he did at that moment, the confused stares and shouts of anguish and then horror that had been directed at him, Maddie had shouted at him. It was basically sacrilege, what he had done, but it had to be done, he physically couldn’t have done anything else, consequences be damned. He had no choice.  </p><p>                Vlad threw up the front lid of the casket, something no one else would have been able to do, since the casket had been effectively locked, and the lid too heavy to be lifted with one arm, let alone flung open. The hinges creaked then snapped as the lid fell against them and the top half of the casket slammed into the floor behind the altar, but he could care less. He ignored how the sounds behind him suddenly shifted from outrage to unnerving silence. Vlad, carefully as he could, picked up the shivering, panicking boy inside.</p><p>                The boy was near hysterics himself, pupils blow wide, breathing erratic. But his eyes, oh his <em>eyes</em>, they glowed that same toxic, unmistakable green that the Ghost Zone did, the green glow of ectoplasm. Vlad could even <em>feel </em>the thrum of ecto<em>energy</em> in the boy as he picked him up, dragging him into a sitting position. Daniel was weak, like a struggling kitten, as he strained against Vlad to see what was going on, the green in his eyes flickered out. Vlad hardly remembered to breathe as his mind confirmed what his core already had known. </p><p>                Daniel Fenton had come back to life three days after his death, but that hadn’t mattered to Vlad then. No, the only thing that mattered when Vlad had picked up the distressed teen was that he was no longer alone.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>One of the reasons I didn't include this in the original is that I felt it wasn't as impactful if what Vlad was up to was known, but I feel it works really well as an extra. So, I have one more idea to write for this, which I will, but I will take recommendations if there is something particular you want to see. </p><p>Thanks for the comments and kudos, btw, I like them very much.</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Well, that's my first contribution to the writing area of this fandom. Hope you liked it. Might add some snippets as later chapters, but I really like where I ended this one. Thanks for reading.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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